


Madness

by Warp5Complex_Archivist



Category: Star Trek: Enterprise
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2006-02-25
Updated: 2006-02-25
Packaged: 2018-08-15 17:21:35
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8065240
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Warp5Complex_Archivist/pseuds/Warp5Complex_Archivist
Summary: Did Trip imagine something more happened while he was trapped on the desert planet with Jon? Spoilers, 1.24 "Desert Crossing." (01/30/2003)





	

**Author's Note:**

> Note from Kylie Lee, the archivist: this story was originally archived at [Warp 5 Complex](http://fanlore.org/wiki/Warp_5_Complex), the software of which ceased to be maintained and created a security hazard. To make future maintenance and archive growth easier, I began importing its works to the AO3 as an Open Doors-approved project in August 2016. I e-mailed all creators about the move and posted announcements, but I may not have reached everyone. If you are (or know) this creator, please contact me using the e-mail address on [Warp 5 Complex collection profile](http://archiveofourown.org/collections/Warp5Complex).

He's begging me to go and all I can do is come up with shitty excuses about work. Alright, maybe not quite begging, but it's close enough. Damnit he's just done that smile thing to me. Hell, how can he do that to me and not mean it? I mean am I just going mad? Too many hours with warp engines and not thinking about him and then he does that smile thing and I agree to go to a desert. OK, maybe that and him threatening to take Malcolm. Mad, definitely mad.

Well the food was just fine until we got to that essence thing...I couldn't eat it. I can't digest stuff like that—but there was nowhere to spit, and that would be such a social no-no. Can you imagine T'pol's disgust at me? And there's Jon making a face like he wants to throw and I want to laugh at him.

Game—some game. I've just spent my time running around with Jon half naked and I didn't wrestle him to the ground and kiss him. He's just touched my arm—hand on my skin—his hand, my skin. It kind of burned, but then everything kind of burns round here and I'm just making everything worse thinking about it.

It was just too tempting to ask him about being a great warrior, interstellar gossip is better than the stuff you get on Enterprise. He saves eighty-nine people and in three months it becomes an entire race saved from extinction. But he could do that. He could. I know, I have faith in him.

We're stuck here, we have no means of escape, I hate not being able to do anything to help us out of the situation, my muscles ache like hell from being barged into once too often and I can't get the picture of Jon without a shirt out of my head. I imagine myself running into him, knocking him to the ground, sprawling over him. Holding his hands above his head so he can't struggle, kissing him, persuading him that it could be OK. Good going Trip. You just sit here and go mad while they bomb the hell out of everything around you. You just sit here and lust after your captain and do nothing and it'll all be fine.

We're moving. I wanted to move. I just didn't want to be moving in the desert, under the sun. Things are becoming a little hazy but Jon's here so it'll be OK. It's always OK with him around. But what'll happen? I don't want to die out here in the desert but I want him to survive and if he stays with me we'll both die. And he's talking about 'easy', god, I'd be easy for him. I would, I'd lie back, take anything he wants. So now he half carries me and I can feel that burning and his hip bumping against mine and I'm stinking of sweat and my mouth is rotten and Jon's next to me and not leaving me. Madness, this is madness. Jon's pointing to something and I'm having a hard time just breathing, but he's next to me still.

The water is foul and I spit and he makes me drink more of it. He's telling me I need the water but all I really need is to be near him. He's pleading with his eyes again. It was that damned pleading that got me here in the first place. But he's touching me. More than he's ever touched me before. Touching me and being next to me. Now he's my captain, orders, orders, but he's still near me. Some kind of games to keep me awake when all I want to do is sleep. I can hardly hear his words, just his voice. Maybe if I kissed him now he'd forgive me. Maybe we could both pretend that I was losing it because of the heatstroke. Maybe he'd play games after sex. Maybe that's what he likes.

He's making me promises about anything I want. He's talking about food. He wants me to talk about food. Oh I can do that. Think about dining with him. Sitting in that dining room with him and T'pol and not lunging across the table to kiss him when he quirks his eyebrows at me. Pecan pie—I can feel his smile with my eyes closed. Do you think I could feel that smile in the dark, when he puts his arms around me. I think I could. He's not touching me right now but I can feel him there. He's near and he's saved my life and I owe him. Does owing him mean not jumping him? Should I be polite and stay away—nice, polite, southern boy Trip.

Xanadu? Isn't that supposed to be like heaven?

Next time he touches me I'll kiss him. Half mad with hunger and dehydration I'll kiss him.

He puts his hand on my shoulder and I look at him, at the worry in his eyes, concern for me for my well-being. I curl my arm up round his neck and keep looking into those eyes, the ones I see in my sleep. The grit on my eyelashes makes me blink hard and my eyes are so raw it's like sandpapering them. So I keep my eyes shut and feel the sweat on the skin on the back of his neck and the shortness of his hair. I spread my fingers against the curve of his skull and pull his head towards me and there's no resistance.

I think he ought to be pulling back and I tug harder and he's still not resisting so his lips meet mine with a bump and I feel my head knock the pillar and I hold him there because I couldn't bear him to pull away. I move my mouth, trying to remember how to kiss through this thirst, when my lips are dry and I can't slide my tongue against his because my mouth is so parched. Then his fingers are between my head and the pillar, his hand is behind my head and his lips move on mine, cracked skin against my own, unromantic and ravenous and I don't need to remember how to kiss because he's kissing me and all I have to do is respond. All I have to do is feel his tongue touching my lips, hot and dry, and I open my mouth and his tongue is against mine and the hand that isn't holding my head is touching the hot hot skin of my neck and his thumb is stroking the spot below my ear and there's sand and grit between us and I'm moaning.

I think it's me. It could be Jon. No, it's me moaning because he's moving away from me and his hip isn't resting against mine any more but that's because he's kneeling astride me. Now his hands are either side of my head and I can feel him looking at me like I know I'd feel his smile in the dark and so I open my eyes and try and speak with them.

I have to tell him somehow just how much this means so I gaze at him and he stares back at me, asking me if I'm sure. And my hands, of their own accord it seems, grasp his hips and pull his groin down to meet mine and now he must know just how sure I am because I want him so badly and I can't hide it.

I can feel his cock hard against mine through the layers of cotton.

And we're both groaning now and he's kissing me again, his mouth angled down against mine. His fingers are in my hair and I struggle to grip his hips as he grinds against me, heavenly friction, don't want him to move away from me, couldn't bear to lose his heat. He has one hand against my spine, pushing my top up, and I can feel every grain of dirt that comes between him and me. His tongue sweeps across my cracked lip and he rocks more gently against my cock. The change in pressure makes what little breath I have catch in my throat and I think I might just come now. The earth is shaking around us, the whole room is tilting and it's not been like this before.

Then he's gone from me and I can't move to follow him, I have no strength to go after him.

And I want to tell him that I found Xanadu.

He's holding me again, tight against his chest protecting me from what? From myself? Everything's falling around me and we're moving again. He's half carrying me. Defending me with his own body and I don't care any more because I can feel him against me and whatever happens is just fine as long as he doesn't leave me again.

Lights and noise and then there's T'pol and cool fresh water and I can't move but I can hear Jon's voice. Jon's here. It'll be all right. I shut my eyes against the light and try to remember those minutes, feel the taste of him in my mouth before the water washes it away.

Madness, all madness from start to end.

* * *

Dr Phlox is standing over me, grinning at the pleasure of having a patient. I taste my mouth and wince, really need to clean my teeth. Touching my tongue to my lips I feel moisture and the skin is soft and tastes of ...cherry? Cherry lip balm.

"Cherry?" I say and it comes out all deep and not like me at all. He nods. Intelligent opening line from someone back from the dead.

"The captain said you might like the cherry flavour."

Captain. Jon. Fire races across my skin and I cover my face with my arm, groaning.

"Commander?" He's got that 'curious human' note in his voice. "Are you feeling all right?"

I mumble something into my elbow and he takes my temperature, pulls my hand down and pats it gently. And Jon is standing behind his shoulder looking down at me, smiling.

"Captain..." My voice sounds creaky and off balance still.

"Ah, Captain Archer," the doctor turns from me to look at Jon, but he's still looking at me. "The Commander will be fine in a day or so. He just needs some time to recover, sleep and eat."

"That's good. It's been a tough couple of days, mentally and physically." The doctor vanishes and I hear the door slide shut.

Jon's still standing there looking down at me. He sounds so normal. "When you're feeling human I'll get Chef to cook you that meal." He smiles again. Like nothing has changed. We...didn't we? I attempt a smile and find that my mouth works in a strange, detached from my face kind of way and I hope it doesn't come out too much like a grimace. "Trip?"

"Captain?"

"How are you doing?" No intimate intonation, an enquiry about my health.

"Better. Alive. Thanks to you." It must have been in my mind. Nothing happened. I never touched him. He never touched me.

"I'm glad you're back in the land of the living." He's standing away from the bed. He's not touching me, he's not telegraphing me messages with his eyes. He's just the Captain, like he always is. It's all so vague. I remember leaving the camp, I remember a burning desert and water. I remember the captain being there and never leaving my side. I thought about kissing him, I thought I did kiss him. I thought he kissed me.

"I don't want you on duty till you're better. That's an order."

"Captain."

And the room is empty and my head is full of images and I'm not sure I'll ever be fine again, whatever the good doctor says.


End file.
